Wednesday, March 18, 2009

Gin

My mother’s family is big on nick names. My great-grandmother it seemed had a thing for giving her kids nicknames that were in no way connected to their real names. For example my mom has an uncle called “Bolo” but his real name is Aingeru, no one has any idea of how the hell my great-grandmother came up with the nickname of “Bolo” but he’s been Bolo all his life. I have an uncle nicknamed “Tank” but one look at him and the source of the name is obvious, the man is built like one. My mother’s cousin Betsy aka “Chickie” ( no one knows the reason for that one either) called her from the cemetery and she was confused.

“Maggie who the hell is this Alonso person buried with my mother?”

“That’s Uncle Gin. Betsy.”

“I didn’t know his name was Alonso! How the hell did abuela get ‘Gin” from Alonso? ”